


slender Aphrodite has overcome me with longing for a girl

by starraya



Series: the long ache of love [1]
Category: Holby City
Genre: F/F, explicit lesbian content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2019-01-05 10:21:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12188112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starraya/pseuds/starraya
Summary: For days and days, Bernie’s kisses echo through her bones.





	slender Aphrodite has overcome me with longing for a girl

Serena isn’t accustomed to waiting.

In her work life, she is a woman who does not dilly-dally. She abhors time-wasters. Yearns for efficiency. Surgery is unpredictable, of course. There are complications: bleeds and crashes. Hearts stop – their dance suspends midway between beats – and they must be massaged and pumped, given a music sheet from which to work, a rhythm to follow once more. Some forget the steps. Some remember. They thump steadily on, or flutter perilously, or jump and jolt. Hearts are unpredictable like that.

People are unpredictable like that.

The first time Serena Campbell waits for Bernie she does not know she is waiting. She does not hear the stars whispering to each other as they collude. She does not see the firewood – layer upon layer, building for months – until Bernie throws the first match in.

Until her lips are on hers. 

And here it is, drawn out a little messily – with fumbling hands and unexpected sighs and mouths that are learning, tongues searching, sliding, pushing, plunging to find it – the answer to the question Serena hadn’t even thought of. 

Serena kisses Bernie and her heart races, skips beats and ahead of itself. She likes women now. She kissed a woman. Bernie Wolfe is a woman. Serena’s blood rushes, thunders in her ears. How can no one else hear it? For days and days, Bernie’s kisses echo through her bones. They ring in her heart, in her head. How can no one else hear it? In the elevator, when Serena stutters her words and slips glances at Bernie, her heart rate stutters and slips too.

She thinks of their hands, as they stand apart. She thinks it would only take Bernie’s fingers brushing against her wrist, a quick press of the pad of one finger to her pulse – a routine check, they do it all the time with patients – and Bernie would see through her awkward lies. Would see, would feel exactly what she has done to Serena.

In the corridor, she admits it. _I’ve never been more than friends with a woman before and you’ve terrified the life out of me._ She tremors. Bernie invites her into theatre, and her heart relaxes, slows, settles as she operates with Bernie. They fall into their familiar pace.

Serena scrubs out, retreats to their office and her heart quickens once more with the thrill of anticipation. Their kiss the week before opened a landscape between them, new and unventured. She draws a chair to her desk and waits for Bernie to join her. She opens a bottle of wine, pours them both a glass.

Bernie never takes a sip of hers. 

_We should toast our undeniable sexual chemistry and say no more about it._

Serena’s heart drops in her stomach.

-

Her heart falls out of rhythm for weeks, she and Bernie fall out of rhythm – always on different shifts, missing each other by a few minutes. _Like ships in the night._

Bernie receives an offer of secondment and Serena’s heart stops. She perches on her desk, twists her hands and stumbles over her words. _If that’s what you really . . . really wanted._ Once out her mouth, they hover in the air. Thicken.

Bernie drifts towards her and her eyes flicker to Bernie’s lips. The air stirs, slightly, imperceptibly, with their breathes and Serena steps forward to close the distance between them.

Their hearts – in unison – crash back into rhythm, shuddering, speeding . . .

Bernie leaves for Kiev.

-

Serena waits, heart heavy.

Loving Bernie, kissing Bernie is like opening a bottle of wine and letting it spill and splash on the floor. The liquid glistens at first, but it soon dries up. And when it does, it stains.

Even the mouth of another, the hands of another – as Serena tries and finds out – cannot wash away the stain of Bernie Wolfe.

-

Serena buttons up a new blouse with trembling hands. Her heart jangles all morning. Leaps at the sight of tanned skin and sun-bleached hair.

Bernie nearly leaves her again.

 _I won’t_ , she whispers, _if you give me a reason to stay._

Serena’s heart burns inside her chest, and she seeks relief, desperately, from Bernie’s lips.

-

“Please . . .”

She gasps for breath, can’t finish her sentence. Her heart clenches, her fists clench, one around the bedsheet, one in Bernie’s hair. _Please don’t make me wait any more_.

Bernie’s tongue flicks the tip of her clit.

Serena’s eyes slam shut. Bernie sinks another finger into her. She falls, so deeply and so hard, until she floats. Eyes still closed, her body thrums and somewhere in the haze of it all, she hears Bernie – faintly – move back up the bed. Her eyes flutter open, her heart flutters anew, when Bernie presses a kiss to her lips.

“No more waiting,” she promises, resting her forehead against Serena’s.

Serena realises she voiced her plea, but she doesn’t care. She entangles her fingers in Bernie’s hair and kisses her, draws every last taste of herself from Bernie’s lips, before sliding her hand between them and against wetness.

Serena feels Bernie’s heart thud against her own.


End file.
